Are you an audiophile in the EU and want to get some of the Massdrop exclusive headphones and DAC/amps but don’t want to pay so much more and wait longer? It looks like your prayers have been answered because Masdrop has just launched a European shipping test…

This is the definition of a very deep cut 🙂 If you happen to be looking for a copy of the 2007 book “Import and Export Market for Parts for Audio-Frequency Electric Amplifiers, Microphones, Loudspeakers, Headphones, Earphones, and Combined Microphone-Speaker Sets in United States”, you are in luck! A copy is available in “Used – Acceptable” condition for $9~ by Amazon Warehouse Deals actual. The note says that “associated media” may not be included. In new condition, this 94-page printed book by Philip M. Parker and published by the ICON Group goes for $188…

This is a PSA! It looks like Schiit Audio is no longer selling through Amazon. Some of their listings appear to be in the process of getting hijacked by opportunist marketplace sellers, as the product name and gallery pictures get changes to random things (cables and bluetooth headphones) but the customer reviews and answered questions remain. The old listings are of interest to anyone looking for reviews and answers about potential issues and Amazon should really preserve these because that’s one of the reasons people go to their website.

So don’t be surprised if your bookmarks for these show random crap:

+ the worst of all, the SCH-13 Sys Passive Preamp has been hijacked by a bluetooth headphone that has an active listing and it is selling on the strengths of the SYS review score
+ there’s also an HTML snafu where they didn’t end the bold tag properly, so all the customer reviews on the main product page are in BOLD

I’m not sure how they do it. Maybe they found a loophole to hijack it by creating additional options on the root product and then taking over because the root product is inactive? Regardless, this is BAD!

PS: but the co-founders e-book continues to be available for the Kindle for $4.99 or as a paperback for $15…

CanJAM SoCAL 2018 happened this weekend and with it, it brought more new headphones. I’ll “digest” these in the next few days but in the meantime, we have another “digest”, Monoprice surprised with a second Big Bang of 2018, revealing two Alex Cavalli co-branded headphone amps and two open-back headphones that “borrow” the Sennheiser 600/650 naming scheme but Monoprice states ““designed from the ground up for the Monolith series”. Not many details are known about these yet, but we summarized what is published at the Monoprice Big Bang II post…

A sad day in the world of A/V, Oppo Digital (the US persona of the company based in the Silicon Valley) is going to stop making new products but will continue to provide support, warranty and repairs for their existing products. This was posted in a farewell post on their website. We discuss this more at the content-side of this website…

How this will impact the pricing of their existing inventory, only time can tell. It depends on how much else they have available to sell, how much people love them, and what other competitive options are and will come out in the next few months/years. They will continue to sell them through their own store and other marketplaces such as amazon.com.

There is an on-topic controversy of the earbud kind the headphones sub-reddit. The owner of Venture Electronics, the makers of the famous VE Monk earbuds, threatened to ban any customer who leaves a customer review that is less than “5 out of 5” on their website. This obviously did not sit well with consumers as it is a bad practice. I’ve written an opinion blog-post on this. Spoiler alert: it’s a bad idea!

I will monitor the situation and decide what to with regards to future VE deal-posts here depending on whether/how the company/owner attempts to clean up their act.

NOTE that the items below are to consider purchasing AFTER you receive the respective Adorama $80 and $130 gift certificates with your headphones. Not before (unless you want/need to buy these items)…

1. V-Moda headphone accessories
They carry a number of V-Moda original accessories, for example, the XL Memory Cushions currently go for $20 with free shipping and fit the various V-Moda over-ear models.

Another V-Moda item with free shipping is the well-regarded V-Moda Boom PRO mic, currently goes for $30 with free shipping.

2. Used Headphone Gear
Dive into the USED section of their website and fish for used headphone deals. This is a link to the search results for used headphones. I check these on a regular basis and when I find deals I post them, eg the the two Fiios earlier today.

3. Memory Cards
They are a camera dealer first and foremost, so you will find plenty of microSD memory cards to feed your DAPs and your smartphones and PADs (Phones as DAPs).

4. General Audio Accessories
One can never have too many cables and adapters and such, or even headphone cases. But don’t forget that they are a camera store, and a number of camera bags/cases can also be used or repurposed as headphone/audio cases as well. Cameras and lenses are typically more fragile than headphones after all.

We often mention Used Amazon deals here, so this is of interest if you are shopping at Amazon Warehouse Deals. Amazon is now giving them a logo and branding of their own. Their new name is “Amazon Warehouse”, which sounds perhaps more attractive to a general audience. You can see this in the screenshot below and also at the Warehouse Deals home page. It makes it easier color-wide to separate it from Amazon’s own new condition listings.

If you want a live listing to see it, there are multiple of them at the used ATH-M40x listing. That’s where the screenshot was taken above.

Amazon is notorious for experimenting with things, so you may not see it immediately. Sometimes they show changes to a subset of customers, eg based on browser, operating system, screen size, and so forth. Thus the screenshots here so you’ll know it’s coming.

Black Friday season is upon us and we are getting in full form! We have the first in our series of Black Friday coverage. A detailed summary of the headphones mentioned in the 2017 Black Friday Ads. We are breaking things down by headphone type, so you can get an overall feel of what’s available in the market. This is a value-added feature as the individual ads already tell you what each particular retailer offers.

Mayhaps it’s easier to explain this with a screenshot instead of words 🙂

Almost all the major retailers have already revealed or leaked their Black Friday ads by now. This year is the second earliest that we could get Black Friday, so there wasn’t as much time in November. The benefit of this is that there will be a longer period in-between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

This was a jam-packed week with lots of interesting posted around the web in the world of headphones, rounded up in our weekly This Week in Headphoolia, with a wide range of topics, from Viet-Fi, to memory card mythbusters to SBC vs Apt-X (Bluetooth) to Immersive/Binaural audio talk, to a Schiit-y tour, and the return of the Headphone Jack Crisis, 2017 Google Edition!

Another week is gone, and this means a new edition of our This Week in Headphoolia is up, a semi-humorous (attempt) at a round-up of the week that was in the world of headphones. The story of the week was perhaps the official farewell of the iPod Nano and Shuffle. But fear not Shuffle fans who happen to also be Spotify subscribers, there’s a Shuffle-like device for Spotify users 🙂

If you missed any of the previous editions, fear not, they are waiting for you in the Headphoolia archives. Time sure does fly, we’ve been doing these for half a year already (!).

A new week is in the books, and we have a new weekly “e-zine round-up”, a new This Week in Headphoolia with more fallout from the Sony MDR-Z1R measurefefe, two high profile reviews of the Mr Speakers AEON, an AudioQuest factory tour, a THX update, and lots and lots of new reviews, especially of earphones.

Another year flew by, and Prime Day 2017 is almost upon us! This year it starts six hours earlier, the sales will start rolling out at 9pm Eastern on Monday 7/10/17, and continue throughout Tuesday 7/11/17 which is the actual Prime Day. The party will wind down at 3am Eastern on Thursday.

Just like last year, we’ll keep track of as many of the sales as we can throughout the 30-hour period!

It’s Sunday PM, and that means, a new This Week in Headphoolia has just been posted. There’s new FOCAL consumer headphones, a new discussion on neutral headphones, and many reviews and first impressions of various headphones and assorted devices.

For all previous editions, check the Headphoolia archives. Please leave comments at the appropriate posts for feedback, corrections, suggestions, recommendations, etc. These are created for YOU, so your feedback can help shape and change them 🙂

Hooray! I’ve finished earlier this weekend and a new This Week in Headphoolia round-up has been posted. Two of the biggest stories of the week are sort of interrelated, significantly differing Sony MDR-Z1R measurements, and a new research paper finding NO correlation between the a headphone price and its headphone frequency response.

This our 17th edition already! You can find all the previous ones in the Headphoolia archives. You will also find all the future ones there, but you can only read the future ones in the future 🙂

Radio Shack stores are closing, so you may find some clearance headphones and accessories (cables, adapters, etc) at good prices. Keep in mind, Radio Shack does not carry “audiophile” products, so you are more likely to find popular consumer brands along with their own house brands (eg Auvio). Prices and availability may vary by store, so there’s a big YMMV on this.

Surprise! It’s still Saturday but somehow I managed to complete this week’s This Week in Headphoolia round-up! Hooray! It is ready to go, waiting for you to checkout. It has the usual mix of news and reviews and “learnings” 🙂

You can also check previous installments in the Headphoolia archives. Somehow we managed to have 12 editions already!

A new installment of our Weekly Round-UP of the world of headphones is up! This is Episode #11 of “This Week in Headphoolia” covering the week ending Sunday May 7 (2017). We have the usual assortment of reviews (text and videos), news-bytes, some “learnings”, and even some attempts to bring humor to the world of audiophiles that at times can be rather humor-resistant 🙂

Another week went by, and so we have another weekly round-up, the new This Week in Headphoolia #10 covers up to Sunday 4/30/17, and includes the Sennheiser HD 820 leak, an assortment of reviews, an equalizing tutorial, another detailed CanJam report, and more… You can also check all previous installments in the Headphoolia archives…

April Fool’s Day is upon us, which makes this big headphones sub-reddit thread all the more curious. According to the very serious sounding and acting thread over there, discussion of headphones with an MSRP of $200 or less is banned from the sub-reddit. The reasoning of that is to cut back on entry-level and newbie talk and focus more on “audiophile” products.

It’s already April 1st in some parts of the world and Reddit is a global website. On the other hand, this looks like a serious attempt, offending messages to “rule 10” are getting deleted, lists of ineligible headphones are being produced, and such.

What do you think? It looks like a 50-50 to me but either way, we will know for sure on April 2nd 🙂